The Internet now makes it easier than ever for businesses to connect with people around the world. While this opens up many new avenues and opportunities, it can make communications costly if you travel regularly for face-to-face meetings or drag on if you rely on emails.
Whether you need to talk to remote employees, international clients, or vendors across the country, Skype is the business communications tool that can keep things simple and personal while saving everyone time and money.
The key to running a successful business meeting on Skype is simply being prepared. While you can’t prepare for every hiccup and glitch, there are plenty of ways you can prepare to mitigate interruptions and keep attendees engaged, here are our top tips:
pre-meeting preparation
Create a group list with everyone’s Skype ID
The first thing you need to do is make sure you have the correct Skype ID for everyone who will be attending the virtual meeting and add them all to a new group list. In this way, you can quickly and simply call everyone at once throughout the day.
Make it clear who is calling who
To avoid any confusion, make it clear in your meeting invitation that you will be calling everyone to avoid receiving multiple calls just as the meeting is supposed to start.
Set start and end times (and be aware of time zones)
Carefully consider your meeting time if you include people in different time zones. Set a start and end time for the meeting that you know you can realistically meet.
Create and distribute an agenda
To avoid a stereotypical “meaningless” meeting, make sure you have drawn up an agenda before the meeting and distribute it with the invitation so that everyone has time to think about the points being discussed. It’s a great idea to try to get everyone involved in the agenda to keep people on their toes and engaged.
arrive early
If you’re online early, it gives you time to resolve any issues you or other attendees have with microphones, Wi-Fi connections, or webcams before the start time to avoid wasting precious time on setup.
During the meeting
Use video if possible
While it may not always be possible for everyone to use video, it’s good to encourage them when possible. It’s much easier to keep meeting attendees engaged if everyone can see each other, not only does it make the experience more personal, but it also makes people less likely to give in to distractions.
Turn off distractions
On the subject of distractions, be sure to minimize any distractions you may have by choosing a quiet room to call into the meeting and closing your emails during the session. There’s nothing more distracting than an intriguing email that pops up at the bottom of your screen when you’re in the middle of a sentence.
Decide actions on the call
To prevent your meeting from becoming a lot of talk followed by little action, be sure to leave time on the call to decide what action to take as a result of the meeting. Once the actions have been decided, you can discuss who will be responsible for each and when they can reasonably be completed.
After the conference
Distribute notes and agreed actions
Finally, so that everything is well anchored and for the sake of total clarity, it is useful to send a copy of the minutes of the meeting and the agreed actions to all the attendees.
